"The Little Dutch Boy"

There is a story, which is a myth, about the "little Dutch boy" who, on his way to school, saw that there was a leak in the dyke. He stuck his finger in the hole to stop the leak and stayed there till a passerby saw him and rushed for help.

The story originates in America, but it has a moral.

Well, here in Finland, we now have the story of the "Finnish grandma" and that is not a myth!

A few months ago, when we bought a new refrigerator cum deep freeze, Annikki redid the small room in the upper floor. Annikki found the floor to be not level. She was going to rip up the floorboards to remove any offending material to level it. I strongly objected and quickly made a small platform with four legs whose height could be adjusted so as to level the base of the fridge.

It was in place for several months, although Annikki was never happy with the solution.

Last Friday was a terribly tiring day. I went to bed early, about 11 pm. I was fast asleep in a couple of minutes. Around midnight, Annikki came up to put off the light, as I normally do not put it off before jumping into bed. I can sleep through anything.

Annikki was planning to get to bed early as she intended to go to church on Saturday morning, something she has been unable to do for several months.

Just then she saw the refrigerator, which stands just outside the bedroom door, shaking dangerously. She cried out to me to tell me that the fridge was going to topple over. In my sleep I told her to just forget it and let it topple over if it had to.

She shut the bedroom door.

I slept like a baby lamb right through till 5 o'clock in the morning. I usually sleep an hour longer on Saturday mornings. I did not find Annikki in bed.

When I opened the bedroom door I saw her sitting on a stool holding up the fridge. She had been there all night!!

I was shocked as I had no idea that the situation was that desperate. Annikki had heard me snoring right through the night, so she had not woken me up!

We got the fridge off the stand and on the floor in a couple of minutes. I found one of the legs had collapsed, causing the platform to rest on just three legs.

Annikki got to bed by 6 in the morning, missing her church.

After she had rested, she explained her vigil, which she described with great laughter and tears. She said that she kept shifting positions, and occasionally dipped her hand into the deep freezer to attack the chocobars which were housed inside. She managed to get her Bible Study book and read through part of the night.

She insisted she go to the church, even though the service was over, to explain why she had not been able to get there in time. She laughed when she got back to the car. She had obviously given a very garbled explanation to her church friends, who must have wondered what she was saying!!

The reason Annikki has a terror about platforms is because of an episode which happened in Madras, India in 1974.

We had a very heavy piece of machinery in our Velacheri garden which was resting on a platform. Our elder boy, Jaakko, and the son, Anbu, of our cook, who was Jaakko's best friend, were playing near it on a tricycle.

The cook, Neela, was making masala dosais. When they were ready she called the children in. They rushed into the house to eat their dosais. Just as they came in the piece of machinery toppled over and flattened the tricycle on which they had been playing.

It was just a couple of seconds that saved the kids from becoming chutney for the dosais.

Ever since, Annikki has an aversion towards platforms of any form.

This episode of last Saturday convinced me that I will not be building any platforms in future!